San Antonio daily light. [volume] (San Antonio, Tex.) 1886-1907, 1887-09-26
CHAPTER l.
- 49,

| heSls, lHe pldCe NutEG MY ONu CulltlllOOu
vas spent You have long hill slopes, GOV
cred with orchards and hanging woods;
Tou have broad valleys, in which are
J peaceful hamlets and yellow corn fields;
| Tou have open spaces on windy hil tops,
where tall thistles are crowned with
winged balls of feathered spray, ready TO
| be blown TO the four corners of the earth by
the carrier winds; you have chalk downs,
with bare turf, and here and there bright
trout stream, where you may see the
quick eyed water rat, or even catch
glimpse of an otter; you have straight and
sturdy cliffs looking out upon the waste
Of waters; you have here and there little
port with its little town; and you have, as
The towering glory and splendOr of the
whole, the undercliff, with its bracken
fields and grassy knobs heaped one above
the other, backed by the crags and faced
by the sea, telling of fallen rocks and I'M
| 1ermining waves.
My name, when I was child and ran
wild among these wonders, learning every
| day to feel their beauty more, was Pleas
ance Noel There are plenty of Noels in
| ID "setshire but none of my kin I'm Lyme.
| Nor do | know how l came To be born
there, nor anything about my mother, who
| died when | was born; nor much about
my father, who was n ship carpenter by
rank and calling. | was born, believe,
In the year one Thousand seven hundred
and eiShty-seven. | never had a birthday,
| because no one cared to remember such an
| insignificant circumstance as the birth of
| D sailors child. My father went down in
| eighty-nine on boa,d the Invincible, which
| foundered in heavy gale off Jamaica, with
| all hands except Swo or three. These
managed to get to land, or to be picked
| up, forget which, and told the disastrous
| story.
Dan CULVER came to my help, being al
ways the most kind hearted of men, and,
| besides, friend of my fathers. He lived
| At RoustlOn, which is three miles and a
| half from Lyme, being then a widower
| with two boys living, two or three years
| older than myself.
| There are good many Gullivers in Dor
| setshire, as we'll as Noels. When first
read 'Gullver's Travels, " it was the more
| real to me, because | was sure that the
| honest captain must have come from my
| part of the country, and | was equally
sure that in appearance he greatly resem-
! blcd Dan.
Nobody, except his sons, ever called him
anything else but Dan. Not Mr.. GULL
| yer, or Daniel CULVER, but plain Dan.
| As early as can remember him he had
gray hair. He was man OF middle
| height and strong build with immense
| hands; he had face covered all over
with crows foot wrinkles, and it had
| the kindliest and gentlest expression
that can dwell upon human cOuntenanCe;
| his light blue eyes rested upon one when
| he spoke as if he loved to look upon his
| friend; he was as incapable of thinking or
| speaking evil as Of doing it. Therefore he
was everybody's friend. l suppose he
| knew very little of evil, living as he did
| upon his seabOard farm, as remote from
the world and as little suspicious of dan
| ger as did those poor men of Laish, who
'dwelt after the manner of the ZidOnians,
quiet and secure"
His estate consisted of q patrimonial
ten acre slip, lying chiefly along the cliff.
| 1t was a poor piece Of land, which grew
| scanty crops, hardly worth the trouble Of
| cultivation; but it gave occupation to the
| two boys, job and Jephthah, and to the
one farm labOrer whom we employed,
| Isaac Agus; Dan himself looked after the
boats, of course. If the land was poor,
| the farm house and yards showed every
| sign of prosperity. There were pigs
which grunted in the sites or roamed
about the yards, grubbing among roots
| with philanthropic resolve to waste no
time in becoming good pork; fowls which
laid eggs and chuckled over them; ducks
| which drove broods of little soft yellow
| balls, which might have been cocoons had
they not been live things, into the pond;
geese, on the waste of land, which cackled
| to each other encouragement to get fat
come Michaelmas; and there were the
most generous Of cows in the matter of
milk The dairy where Mrs. Agus and
l made butter was always full Of cream
| and milk; there were hay ricks, plOws,
| fails, carts, harrows and all the signs of
successful cultivation.
The twin boys, Job and Jephthah, were,
| like their father, of middle height, with
| broad shoulders and big hands; they were
as exactly like each other as pair of
| Cinnamon; but when you came to live in
| the house, you learned gradually to dis
| tinguish certain little differences not appa-
rent to strangers. Outside the farm no one
knew Jcphthah from Job, and addressed
either at random rs Job or Jephthah. They
had blue eyes, like their father, light
brown hair and gentle way, which they
inherited. But they exaggerated the pa
ternal characteristics. His gentleness be-
came, with them, slOwness; his tact
IuiulIN DeGdLlG HDSOluIt uuulDuGSS
The most frequent visitor was Joshua
Mech, Dams nephew. He was miller
at Up Lyme. When l was sixteen he
must have been about six and twenty
some seven years older than the boys.
He, too, was strongly built and well pro-
pOrtiOned, but he had the other Dorset
shire face-not that of the Gulliyers.
Everybody knows that there are two faces
in nnrsetshire-that with blue ewes and
brown hair, a round face, and that with
dark hair and dark eyes, an oval face;
sometimes very beautiful, but sometimes
forbidding and harsh. JOshua's face had
| the latter character. His eyes were too
close together; his expression was threat
ening; his chin too long and square; his
manner was imperative. He was mas
terful man, man who always got what
| he wanted; if he desired thing, he said
he should have it, and he got IL. The his
tory that follows, however, is that of a
thing which he desired vehemently and
did not get. Another visitor, and the
only other friend of the family, was the
rector of Rousdon, the Rev. Benjamin
Burden.
Rousdon parish contained population
of eleven souls, six of whom came from
RousdOn Farm. Its yearly value was
e35. There was also a house with bit
Of glebe land. The house was cottage;
the glebe land was a garden cultivated by
the rector himself. He had an orchard,
the apples of which he sold for cider,
fruit and vegetable garden, two or three
pigs, some fowls, and sometimes, the gift
of his church warden, some ducks. He
was bachelor and lived entirely alone in
his cottage. His church was barn with